


Curried Favor

by BluWacky



Category: Mawaru Penguindrum
Genre: Curry, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-12-25
Updated: 2011-12-25
Packaged: 2017-10-28 01:48:36
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,021
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/302390
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/BluWacky/pseuds/BluWacky
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Once upon a time there was a princess, a penguin, and maybe some very dangerous curry spice...</p>
            </blockquote>





	Curried Favor

**Author's Note:**

  * For [thankyouturtle](https://archiveofourown.org/users/thankyouturtle/gifts).



> Set in the early parts of the series.
> 
> I hope you like your Ikuhara intertextual, but if not, perhaps a quick view of the following Youtube link - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QJyZvG8w6Fk – might be worthwhile for this to make any sense at all.
> 
> Happy Yuletide – and apologies in advance...

_What do you think of the word “fate”?_

 _Does the concept of fate exist in reality?_

 _To put it simply, are people's futures set in stone when they are born, never to be challenged?_

 _Do you believe in such a rule?_

“Kyu,” said Penguin #3 to no-one in particular. She brushed her hair rather forcefully. It seemed to be rather tangled today, and she couldn't possibly answer such a question when her wig was not at its most elegant.

 _How electrifying._

~

Once upon a time, there was a princess grieving over the absence of her mother and father, the king and queen, who had left the kingdom in order to save it from a great and terrible threat. She would never let her sadness show, however, and so she never cried.

Before this princess appeared a penguin. Her appearance confusing, and her ribbon glamorous, the penguin enveloped the princess in the smell of fish. Despite the pungent aroma, the princess never cried.

The princess had a sad fate. She had been cursed to wither from the inside and die, with no hope of a cure. Still, the princess never cried..

The penguin offered her nothing but companionship, skills with a meat cleaver, an array of techniques for defending against cephalopod attack and a remarkable sense of style. Still, even if she chopped onions or accidentally stabbed herself with a knitting needle, the princess never cried.

The princess had resolved to keep on living her life as best she could for what time she had left before the curse robbed her of all she held dear.

Was that really the best thing for her?

~

Himari had never been to India. She couldn't remember the last time she'd left the Marunouchi line – she always seemed to travel round and round the same stations. Hospital, home, hospital. She didn't mind, she told herself. After all, Kanba and Shouma would bring her virtually anything she needed on their way home from school. It was better that she stay safe while she could.

Quite how she came into possession of the curry powder, therefore, she wasn't sure. Her normal repertoire of home comforts – endless rounds of _tamagoyaki_ for breakfast, _nabe_ for late night meals (of which there were more and more these days as Kanba so rarely came home at a sensible hour) – suited the Takakuras just fine. She hadn't bought any curry powder herself, and she knew her brothers wouldn't pick anything up without her say-so – she was the queen of the household, after all.

She was quite surprised, therefore, to find a yellow box on top of her bed as she wandered into her room. It hadn't been there that morning when she'd got up and made breakfast, nor when she had made lunch for herself earlier that day.

Curious, Himari picked up the box and read the label.

“'Billion Fold X Spice?'” she said. Penguin #3 lay on the floor, knitting innocuously. “'The phantom calls of elephants?' Where did this come from, I wonder... Ah well.” She put the box on the dresser next to her stuffed toy bear and wandered back through the house into the kitchen.

The box had followed her onto the kitchen table.

Penguin #3 was inspecting the floor for signs of dust.

How both penguin and box had made it into the kitchen ahead of Himari she had no idea. The Penguin was a law unto herself – but a box of curry powder?

Clearly something mysterious was at work here. Was it destiny? Himari wasn't sure. But it certainly seemed like an interesting coincidence.

“How do you feel about curry tonight?” she asked Penguin #3.

The penguin wiped a single mote of grime from the floor and looked at it with satisfaction. Result!

~

“It's not Curry Day today, Himari.” Ringo was strangely quiet on the phone. “I can't come. I have other things to do tonight.”

The phone clicked off and Himari replaced it in its docking cradle with a sigh of slight annoyance. She'd gone to all this effort to make chicken _katsu_ curry and she had no-one to share it with. Kanba and Shouma had told her they'd be late home _again_ , and now not even Ringo would join her.

She and Penguin #3 had had so much fun making the curry, too! Even if it  _was_ a bit odd that a penguin had no ethical issues about cooking chicken.

Well, everyone else could reheat the curry, Himari reasoned. She wanted to taste this spice.

“Well, let's eat!” she said to her penguin companion, chopsticks in hand.

Perhaps Himari should have been bothered about the hygiene implications of sharing her dinner with an unexplained penguin. Perhaps she should have thought that  _usually_ Penguin #3 would make her own dinner to share with her avian siblings.

But by then it was too late.

As they tucked into the curry, everything exploded.

The cries of phantom elephants went unheard.

Sirens wailed in the distance.

~

“Himari! We're home!” Kanba and Shouma had staked out the Keiju residence once again that evening, but found their efforts fruitless; there were no new developments in their Ringo-related enquiries, and they were both too hungry to sit and wait in the cold night air any longer.

Himari and Penguin #3 were both sat on the floor, admiring themselves in mirrors. For some reason, Himari was wearing a beautiful blonde wig.

“Kyu.” she said.

“Kyu!” said Penguin #3, in a slightly befuddled way.

The brothers blinked for a moment.

“Hima...ri?” said Shouma.

“Kyu!” said Penguin #3.

“Oh, this is not good.” said Kanba, head in his hands.

~

The door burst open and a slightly bedraggled Ringo Oginome burst through it. “Is she okay? Shouma, what was the emergency? You didn't make any sense on the phone...”

Shouma stood in front of her, eyes blank and confused. “Himari... she's...”

Penguin #3 waved a flipper at Ringo. Being a creature of metaphor, however, she went unnoticed.

Kanba was crouched in a corner, muttering incoherently to himself.

Himari had given her mirror to Penguin #1, who had taken the rather unseemly step of using it to look up her skirt. Penguin #2, however, was attempting to feed her a rather large and rather alive fish. More worryingly, Himari appeared to be actually trying to  _eat it_ . Fortunately, her mouth not being designed for the consumption of large – and more importantly,   
_imaginary_ – fish, the likelihood of Penguin #2 accomplishing anything significant was, as usual, small.

Ringo, being oblivious to much of this activity, just saw a slightly catatonic Himari looking up at the ceiling with her mouth wide open. She rushed over to hug her friend.

“Himari? What's wrong?” Ringo turned back to the boys. “Is she...”

“No. She's not Himari. She's a penguin.”

Ringo's eyes went as blank as Shouma's.

“Huh?”

~

The Takakuras and Ringo crowded round the table. 

“None of this makes any sense to me at all. Are you sick in the head? _There are no penguins here_.” 

“Look who's talking, creepy stalker girl...” mumbled Kanba under his breath, before Shouma gave him a sharp nudge with his elbow.

“You can think we're crazy if you want to, but it's the only explanation. Himari has switched bodies with a penguin.”

Ringo rolled her eyes. “I haven't got time for this. She should go to the hospital.”

Penguin #3 crossed its flippers and looked slightly cross.

“Kyu.” said Himari, in a similar pose.

“I... don't think she wants to go.” said Shouma. “Physically I guess she seems okay. Poor Himari...”

Ringo stood up in a temper. “I need to go, this isn't what I was supposed to be doing with my evening. Thanks for nothing.”

“Wait!” Shouma stood up at the same time. “I'm sorry. Look, let's have some dinner at least. Himari's left us something here.”

Ringo paused for a moment, bag in hand, ready to storm out.

“Yes, Ringo,” Kanba joined in quickly in his most seductive of tones. “Please stay and share some food.” Kanba, ever the opportunist, saw this as a chance to check her bag for evidence of the Penguin Drum.

“Well, if you insist.” said Ringo, sitting back down and taking up a spoon. “I shouldn't, but this curry _does_ look delicious.”

“It smells a bit odd, though,” said Shouma, sniffing at the dish tentatively. “How long's it been there?”

Too late  _again_ .

  
“Let's eat!” said Ringo and Kanba.

It's funny how an explosion can go completely unnoticed by an entire neighbourhood. Or perhaps even the people in the same room.

~

“Oh no. No no no no no. HOW HAS THIS HAPPENED?”

'Kanba' patted 'his' body down in horror.

“I can't be a guy! No! My Project! Project M is ruined! I have a -”

Penguin #2 blew a party kazoo. It extended outwards with a loud raspberry noise.

“I can't do it with a -”

Penguin #2 blew the kazoo again, looking rather pleased with himself for having successfully done something twice in a row.

“Momoka...” Ringo – for it was indeed her, in Kanba's body – sank to the floor in horror. “And STOP DOING THAT!” she shouted at her body, which was looking down its blouse with a slightly creepy leer on its face.

Everything was just getting a bit out of hand. 

“Kyu-kyuuuuu kyu-kyu-kyu!” Penguin #3 stood atop the table, the Penguin Hat upon her head, her eyes glowing purple.

~

The Penguin of the Crystal stood at the top of the staircase in a beautiful black dress, a vast cloak billowing out behind it. She pointed a flipper at Shouma and Ringo-as-Kanba and began babbling away in a rather supercilious tone.

  
“I have absolutely no idea what's going on,” said Ringo, in a daze. “This must just be food poisoning...yes, that's right, bad food poisoning.”

The Penguin began to waddle down the staircase, her clothing disappearing in flashes of light as it did so. She looked rather annoyed with herself.

“The curry!” Shouma waved his handcuffs around to emphasise his point. “It's something in the curry!”

The Penguin stopped waddling and heaved a sigh of frustration, as if to say  _well, this isn't really worth the effort_ . She waved a flipper dismissively, and watched as her penguin siblings  _both_ pressed the buttons that would send the two humans on their way back to something approaching reality.

For all the difficulties the survival strategy might have thrown up, she never would have expected  _this_ .

~

Himari lay in bed, feeling incredibly full. She'd eaten a  _lot_ of curry before things had gotten back to normal.

“I think we had fun today, didn't we?” she said to Penguin #3, who had settled at the foot of her bed. The penguin had acquired a pair of glasses from somewhere and it peered over the top of them as it flicked through a copy of a magazine.

Himari sighed. “I think every day should be like today. With everyone together, having fun at dinner time, everyone being energetic...” She trailed off as she settled back into the pillows. “We should all make the most of every day we have.” Himari mumbled as she fell quickly asleep.

Penguin #3 put down the magazine and turned to look at the girl whose body she had taken for a short time. She regarded her silently for a few moments before getting off the bed and waddling away into the darkness.

~

Once upon a time, there was an abandoned princess who was doomed to die for something she had no part in, and a penguin who could only watch.

Beyond the fragile body, and the stubborn cheer, the penguin saw something familiar.  Something haunting and lonely, and most of all frightening.

So there were crazy days of body swaps. There were days of knitting, of playing dress-up, of knowing when to change the TV channel or to let the princess wallow in a memory of a destiny that was not to be, a station she couldn't stop at.

They were days of doing as much as they could with the time they had left. Together.

The penguin thought that was the best thing for both of them.


End file.
